Recency Recipe: Rout Cakes

The Party Snack of Polite Society (and Impolite Gossip)

Feeling like your week’s been a scandal fit for the Morning Chronicle? You deserve cake. We all deserve cake, and not just any cake:

Rout Cakes, the dainty little treats that fueled the drawing-room dramas of the early 1800s. These were the Regency equivalent of canapés; small, sweet, and perfect for nibbling while pretending not to eavesdrop on Lady So-and-So’s latest flirtation.

They appear everywhere from Emma to Vanity Fair to Dickens, which just goes to show: everyone loves a snack with a side of social chaos.

The Original Regency Recipe

I think this is from Mrs. Rundell’s A New System of Domestic Cookery (1806) – certainly most newer recipes appear to be variations on this one, so here we go: 

“To make rout drop-cakes, mix two pounds of flour with 1 pound of butter, one pound of sugar, and one pound of currants, cleaned and dried. Moisten it into a stiff paste with two eggs, a large spoonful of orange-flower water, as much rose water, sweet wine and brandy. Drop the paste on a tin plate floured, and a short time will bake them.”

Bless Mrs. Rundell and her belief that “a short time” is a useful baking instruction. One imagines many a Regency cook staring at the oven, nervously counting seconds like a soldier in Waterloo.  Also, that quantity of ingredients would feed an entire rout (and possibly the band). I’ve adapted the recipe to make a far more reasonable dozen.

Ingredients (modernised, but still tipsy)

• 100 g self-raising flour
• 50 g butter
• 50 g sugar
• 50 g currants
• 1 egg
• 2 drops orange essence (in place of orange-flower water, because who actually has that?)
• 2 drops rose essence (standing in nobly for rosewater)
• 1 tbsp brandy (which, unlike the essences, you definitely have)

Method

1. Preheat your oven to 190°C.
2. Rub the butter into the flour like you’re erasing the memory of last night’s questionable dance partner. Add sugar and currants.
3. Whisk the egg with orange and rose essences, and the brandy. It will smell so divine you’ll start forgiving people.
4. Add the egg mixture slowly until you have a thick paste that holds its shape.
5. Drop heaped teaspoons onto a greased tray.
6. Bake for 10-12 minutes, or as Mrs. Rundell would say, “a short time.”

You’ll end up with twelve little golden delights, like this:

The Verdict

My Austen-loving declared them perfect for tea, or for pretending you’re at a Regency soirée. Sweet, buttery, just a touch boozy, and perfect for nibbling while discussing who danced too often with the same partner.

Final verdict: Mrs. Rundell knew what she was about. Now fetch your teacups (or something stronger) and enjoy a little slice of Regency high society—no invitations required.